PJ Media

“1. By what right is government in schooling?”

In regards to New York State government, Article XI, section 1of the State Constitution: “The legislature shall provide for the maintenance and support of a system of free common schools, wherein all the children of this state may be educated.”

More broadly, (very local) government involvement in schooling is older than the nation, dating back to the 17th Century in the Massachusetts Bay Colony (those Massachusetts liberals!); additionally, the Land Ordinance of 1785 called for setting aside one section of a township for support of public education. It’s fair to say (iirc) however, that public schooling only really blossomed in the “common school” movement in the decades before the Civil War, and throughout the rest of the century; one result is that all 50 state constitutions have some provision vaguely like New York’s. (Now, if that rant is intended to be aimed at the (relatively minor) involvement by the federal government, that’s a more recent practice, and no doubt arguable, but you’ll find that supporters of traditional schooling generally don’t have any predetermined ideological commitment to federal control. Instead, it’s a matter of how best to provide an equitable and high quality education to all our citizens.)

I’m going over this to stress that these hysterical, furious diatribes about how “it needs to be eliminated 100%. all public education should end today. all of it.” and “Government schools should be declared unconstitutional by the SCOTUS” are not at all conservative – at least by any definition of conservatism that involves conserving the best of the past, time-tested practices representing the wisdom of generations, in preference to vast ideological programs of rapid and revolutionary change – rather, they’re deeply and disturbingly radical. Public schooling in America may have developed organically over decades and even centuries and may be deeply rooted in our history and culture, but these folks want to tear up those roots and smash them.

McArdle may be somewhat more measured, but she too ultimately insists that at least when it comes to urban public schools “the system” cannot be reformed from within, and really just has to be overthrown in service of a higher vision, so that a glorious new educational order may arise from the ashes.

Of course, all this does help to explain why supporters of traditional education are concerned that vouchers are intended to “destroy the system”- so many of their advocates insist on it! And – whether liberal or conservative – we’re just not that big on smashing systems, at least ones with children inside.

And while Brother Milton provided much of the intellectual framework (such as it is) for vouchers and all, a lot of support has bubbled up from some of the less pleasant places of the far right. JHoward’s bizarrely misplaced paranoia about schools “instilling a powerful overall philosophy . . .the secular religion postmodernism” points us back simultaneously to Bircher conspiracy-mongering and to social conservatives bewildered and angered by Supreme Court rulings that taxpayer dollars and government employees cannot be used to promote a sectarian agenda of religious instruction. (Shouldn’t that be the parents’ job?). The continuing (and worsening) de facto segregation points all too eloquently at one of the other motives.

But I digress. JHoward screeches that “government schools are an unmitigated disaster“, far away in Central America gcblues rants about deleting “the whole failed enterprise” – but as McKenna points out, this is entirely off base. Most public schools are actually in relatively affluent, often suburban areas, and are considered entirely satisfactory – even vigorously defended. What we’re seeing is part of the Educational Myth – the imaginary and singular “public school”. This obscures the fact that we have at least two very different systems of public schooling – one well-funded and serving a largely quite-advantaged population, and one rather underfunded and struggling, with these insufficient resources, to serve multiply disadvantaged populations whose lives are, as McArdle puts it, full of “other tragedies”. One system is basically thriving (though there’s always room for improvement) – it’s the other one that’s failing. Why? Well, did you read this paragraph?

RiverCocytus argues that “When we say the problem is crime, low income, low social capital, we’re still not making an argument against vouchers“. Maybe yes, maybe no, but if we want to prescribe proper treatment, then it certainly helps to have the correct diagnosis! McArdle’s argument that the system is “sick” sounds relatively measured compared to the spittle-flecked raving about horrible “unionized public employees” or secular-postmodern “government schools” (and to be fair, there are genuine issues), but it fundamentally misses the actual problem. In a sense, gcblues is right when they talk about “planned failure”, but of course the culprit isn’t the fiendish professional education establishment or even some cartoon Heartless Conservative. It’s rather the failures of our past, compounded by the current cowardice that takes refugee in soothing myths – it’s the lazy teachers/ the evil unions/ the “system”- rather than truly face up to less pleasant realities.